


Detached

by TheIceQueen



Series: Sam's blue book [11]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Caretaker Sam Winchester, Confused Dean Winchester, Confusion, Doctors & Physicians, Drugged Dean Winchester, Drugs, Fingore, Frostbite, Gen, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Pain, Painkillers, Restraints, SPN Genre Bingo, Swearing, Torture, Unconsciousness, Worried Sam Winchester, dislocated fingers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-14 03:48:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17500964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheIceQueen/pseuds/TheIceQueen
Summary: Sam finds Dean tortured and passed out from pain and have to call a name out of his blue book to learn how to help him recover.You can easily read this without reading the other fics in this series.The series is build on the idea that Sam has a book full of names of people (mostly doctors) who can help them fast and outside of a hospital. In earlier fics they have met the Hammond family, a dad and three daughters who are all doctors. That's all you need to know. Now you're set to read ;-)To you lovely people who are still coming back to read this after I've neglected this series: I'm sorry and I love you.





	Detached

**Author's Note:**

> Written for:  
> SPN Genre Bingo / Torture  
> Bad Things Happen Bingo / Fingore

”Dean…!”

At first Dean wasn’t even sure the voice was real. He could have been dreaming. He could have been hallucinating. Hell, this could be a part of him waking up in heaven to relive his most badass fights and hunts. But then there was the hand on his shoulder.

“Shit… Dean can you hear me?”

The hand was real. The hand on his cheek was most definitely real. Dean tried holding his head op by himself, but it seemed like Sam’s hand was the only thing keeping it from falling back and hurting his neck again.

His head moved forward and when Sam’s hand left it, he could feel his own breathing lifting it up and down in waves.

“What’s in the buckets…? Dean stay with me!”

Sam’s huge hand wrapped around his elbow and it took all the air Dean had in his lungs to let out a pained whimper when his hand moved in what felt like gloving coal.

“Shit!”

Dean knew Sam. He knew Sam’s voice well enough to know that he was confused and shocked. He tried to speak, but it only became a hum filling his heavy head, and he wasn’t sure it even made it further than that.

The skins sizzled off his hand and he was sure Sam heard that scream. Dean wished for nothing but to pass out, when Sam touched his other arm. He remembered the buckets. There was two of them.

“Hang in there. We’re…”

The words got lost in another scream and before Dean could take another breath, the sound blurred together with the light his eyes hand only just let in through the slim slivers. Then everything went dark and silent.

 

* * *

 

The well-known rumbling of his Baby had always been able to make him calm down. This time he couldn’t separate it from his own moans of pain, when he woke up to his hands still burning.

“Dean?!”

Sam was close but wasn’t next to him. Dean wanted to scream and call out for him to make this stop, but his arms shaking had overtaken his body and his lungs.

“We’re safe. I’ll get you…”

Mercifully, Dean didn’t stay awake to hear the rest.

 

* * *

 

A shock of pain shot through his arm, but somehow it quickly subsided to burning only his hand. When the other arm did the same, he growled and he must have tried to move, because his chin dropped to his chest again.

“Dean…?”

One, familiar and safe hand cupped his jaw.

“Can you hear me…? I think he’s waking up… no, not yet.”

His brain wouldn’t form words so he used what little control he had to try and pull his hands from the fire.

“Easy…” The hand left and came back, immobilizing the only arm he’d managed to move just a little. “It’s only lukewarm.”

He tried lifting his head to look at Sam, but it didn’t happen. It would have been no use anyway. His eyes stayed closed.

“How much can I give him?”

Sam was still holding his arm, but now something else was too. Something cold. Confused Dean tried to pull away, but nothing happened.

Through the pained skin and bones of his hands he hardly noticed the pinch on his arm, but still managed to utter a hum that came from pain and confusion.

“Dean. Listen. Morphine, okay?”

Just to hear that word said in Sam’s voice made him breathe a little easier and forget the nausea left by the fact that he had a needle in his arm. The pain left seconds before the world did.

 

* * *

 

He could see that the light sneaking in to his barely open eyes was dimmed and more soft yellow than white, but is was still too bright. Dean took a deep breath and tried opening his eyes again, but there wasn’t enough room for the light in his head.

Then his hands came back into his life. He gasped and pulled his arms, but he was stuck. Was he back? Had it been a dream, was he still in the warehouse?! He pulled his arms again and his hands flared up.

The sudden grip on Dean's shoulders startled him enough so his head moved and the room started spinning. “Dean!”

Sammy. He filled his lungs with air, trying to convince himself that this time it was real.

“Dean wake up. You’re safe.”

Dean had a hard time believing that. He was trapped. His hands wasn’t burning like he remembered they had done, but they hurt and his arms were stuck so he could do nothing to stop it. Dean was slowly regaining the feeling of the rest of his body. He was sitting upright and his back was aching as if he’d been there for a long time. He tried opening his eyes again and this time a little more light came in and he winched. The sudden added discomfort made him fight the restraints again. He needed to get out, to get some king of control.

“Calm down. I had to tie your hands to keep them in the water.”

“Water…?”

Dean was surprised that he had made a whole word, and even more surprised that it was clear enough for Sam to understand.

“Hang on, I’ll turn down the lights.”

Sam’s hands let go of his shoulders and Dean felt himself slowly falling forward, but he was firmly pushed back before he could think too hard about how he might end up folded in half.

“Dean. Look at me.”

Dean took a deep breath and prepared himself for another wave of piercing pain moving through his skull, but it wasn’t bad. Not bad enough to stop him from opening his eyes and seeing his brother’s shoulders drop inches with a relived sigh.

“You with me?”

“Yeah, but…”

Sam slowly let go of Dean and this time the older Winchester managed to stay seated against the headboard.

“They did a number on you. On your hands.”

Sam looked down and Dean’s eyes followed his line of sight down his tied up arm and to his angry red hand lying incredibly still in a bowl of water. He looked from one hand to the other and instinctively tried to move his fingers, but nothing happened and his breathing sped up as his heartbeat became noticeable to himself.

“Hey, hey. Listen you’re good.”

“Sam. What…? I’m not…”

“It’s frostbite. Do you remember the ice-buckets?”

For a second Dean had no idea what Sam was talking about, but slowly, pictures of a warehouse and people moving round in the dark came to mind. He remembered the buckets. He remembered thinking, there had to be snakes or acid in there, and he remembered being relieved when it was only ice water and being grateful when his right hand became numb. Dean frowned in thought. His right hand was hurting before the ice.

“Dean?”

“Yeah, I remember.”

“Can you move your fingers?”

Dean shook his head and looked for signs for what that meant on Sam’s face. His brother was thinking, but he didn’t seem like all hope was out.

“Okay, it’s not a problem yet. I called Marie Hammond she…”

“Marie?”

“Gemma’s sister. The one who was studying frostbites.” Sam looked a bit more worried now. Dean figured that he was supposed to remember who Gemma was.

“Oh, yeah.” Dean nodded and tried to disguise that he was still thinking hard to remember.

“Well, she said that we should warm your hands up slowly with lukewarm water. It might take time Dean.”

He was ready for this to be over. All the time he’d been sitting there his skin had burned hotter for every minute and he could swear that his bones was soaring up through his arms by now.

“Dean. I need to take the water away. You can’t have them in there all the time.”

Dean leaned his head back to the headboard and looked into the ceiling. Trying to prepare for the pain and for hiding most of it from Sam. His little brother was already hating himself for having to do that. Dean could practically smell it of him.

“You need morphine. I’ll knock you out first.”

He didn’t want that, he’d already been out of it enough for one day. He didn’t even know if it was still the same day.

“No, Sam. I don’t need that.”

Already with the syringe connected to the IV needle in Dean’s arm, Sam looked up and locked eye contact.

“You do.” The face on Dean’s little brother was closing down any argument. “You were fighting the ropes and made sounds that were probably meant to be swears, when I did it while you were drugged before. Trust me you need it.”

Before Dean could speak, not that he would argue after that statement, Sam had already pressed in the drug. The pain was the first to leave him and when Sam placed a pillow behind his neck, he slowly vanished in a fog of white and then black.

 

* * *

 

“How are you feeling?”

Slowly, Dean’s sight came back and joined the sound in making him more alert.

“Do you need painkillers?”

“Don’t…”

Sam helped Dean angle his head vertical against the pillow. “I’m not knocking you out. Do you need painkillers?”

“Yeah.”

Dean focused on where Sam touched his arm and then on his hands.

“Your fingers are getting a better color. Marie said that lighter means it’s going the right way.”

Normally, Dean didn’t care much for morphine, it made him lightheaded, but when his skin once again stopped aching and he could relax his shoulders, he praised its existence.

“Good?”

Dean nodded, slowly not to provoke a dizzy spell.

“Good.”

Sam looked at Dean’s left hand. “Dean? Can you move your fingers?”

The relief of seeing his ring- and middle fingers twitch, almost covered the plain of moving in the water. Sam exhaled probably all the air he had in his lungs.

“Sam?”

Dean looked at his right hand, or he looked at the towel covering the bowl it was in.

“Don’t try to move that one.”

“What? Sam, what’s going on?!”

It was difficult to follow Sam’s order. He needed to know that it was okay. That _he_ was okay. He needed both of his hands.

“It’s not bad Dean. Do you remember what happened before they froze your hands?”

He didn’t. Right now he wasn’t even sure who had taken him in the first place. He just remembered the pain. It was sudden. He remembered the sound, traveling through his bones and resonated in his head, even making it through his own scream. He looked at Sam.

“It’s okay. We can set them. You can move your fingers and that hand is almost back to normal color. Marie said it won’t be long till your skin is good.”

“How many?”

“Three.”

Dean only remembered one. If they were torturing him, they wouldn’t have done it while he was out. Maybe all of it was just melting together in his brain.

“Let me see.”

Sam nodded and walked to the other side of the bed and took the towel away. Dean’s little finger was pointing up and away from the rest, his ring finger turned at the second knuckle and so did his index finger. He could have sworn that the joints had started hurting as soon as he’d laid eyes on them.

“Dean?” Sam pulled over a chair and sat down. “Dean, can you move just your thumb?”

The concentration needed to move just one of his rigid fingers was making his head spin. It didn’t happen.

“It’s okay Dean, it’s still early.”

Dean took a deep breath and held it as he tried again. There was a little twitch. At least he was sure there was a little twitch. He looked at Sam with anticipation. Sam didn’t seem to have seen it, so he tried again.

Sam gasped and this time Dean was happy to feel the pain from the water moving around his skin. Exhausted he leaned his head back into the pillow.

“Good. Dean, this is good.”

The sound of relief on Sam’s voice had never sounded sweeter.

“Relax for now. I’ll take the ropes of when you can take your hands up next time. Then you can lie down.”

Lying down sounded pretty damn good right about now. He’d been sitting since he was placed on that wooden chair in that warehouse.

“Wait… who got me?”

“You don’t remember?”

Dean shook his head waiting for Sam to enlighten him, but Sam shook his head too.

“I shot one of them. Silver bullet, but I don’t know. I was kinda in a hurry to get you.”

“You don’t know either. Were they human?”

Sam shrug his shoulders. “We’ll figure it out. It’s not important right now.”

Dean’s head felt heavy and his eyes were closing on him without his permission.

“Are you sure you didn’t give me too much of that stuff?”

He didn’t see the smile on Sam’s face but he could hear that it was there.

“I didn’t give you that much. You’re exhausted. Passing out from pain and being drugged will do that to you.”

His eyes had closed and his head was leaning all the way back to the headboard, but he managed to nod and smile.

“I guess we’ll figure out who the hell did this when I can wipe my own ass.”

Sam’s chuckle was silenced by sleep before it was over.

 

* * *

 

Dean woke up from movement he’d forgotten how felt. His hands were hurting but the burning was gone and his arms were moving. Maybe even hovering. He hummed and turned his head.

“Just untying you. Figured you would wake up when I took the water away.”

The air in the room felt soft on his skin, his palm was hurting though. When he finally was able to focus on anything, he looked at both hands, lying limp on a towel in his lap. Well, one was limp, the other was just not moving. It definitely looked strained. Both of them were still slightly pink, but no more than a normal cold wind could make them.

As soon as the last rope left his elbow, he sat up straight, hissing as the towel scraped against his abused skin.

“Easy.”

Sam took his wrists and lifted the hands as Dean got situated with his legs crossed. They placed his lower arms on his knees so the hands were hovering in free space.

Sam sat down on the foot end of the bed. “Can you move them?”

Dean hadn’t even considered trying. He’d just been happy that the pain was only raw and itching with discomfort. His left hand almost made a loose fist before the stretching of the skin became too much. The right was another story. His whole arm was shaking and his sight became spotted in green and yellow. Sam must have seen him struggling, maybe swaying, because his hand was quickly on his brother’s shoulder. Dean didn’t stop till his thumb and middle finger had bend enough that he could see all joints moving.

Panting for air he closed his eyes and steadied himself against Sam’s support.

“How does the skin feel? Do you think I can touch it?”

Dean shook his head, but gathered himself and looked up and nodded.

“Sure? It’s just some balm, but it can wait a little longer.”

“No. I’m good.”

If it would help this to be over sooner or maybe even take away some of the pain when he stretched the skin, then he needed it now. Sam stood up and got the little tube and put on gloves before putting some on a loose glove and scooped some up with his index finger.

He looked at Dean with a look that practically begged him to change his mind, but Dean just smiled back at him. Sam moved his hand op to meat Dean’s left palm to let the pink hand rest on his. Dean hissed and tensed his shoulder, but the latex glove did little to provoke the skin when it was still. Sam’s finger smearing the balm over his knuckles wasn’t too bad. Worse than the hand holding his, but less painful than the towel from before.

“You okay?”

Dean nodded and decided that there wasn’t really a reason for his jaw being that tight. He took a deep breath.

“It’s all good Sammy.”

Sam let the hand go and clearly hesitated before approaching the other. Dean watched his brother fill his lungs with air and hold it for a few seconds before releasing it, and then lift his hand op to meet the twisted hand.

The skin was the same, maybe even a bit better, as Sam started on the thumb. Dean’s entire arm shook and he almost bit his tongue as he clenched his jaw again when Sam touched his index finger. Sam stopped and looked at Dean trying desperately to make this seem like nothing.

“I’m good…”

“Dean. Let’s wait. You can do the water a few more times.”

Dean shook his head and drew air in sharply through his nose, before looking op again.

“No. You know it’s not the frostbite.”

Sam bit his lower lip and nodded as he scooped some more balm up. “Sure?”

“Just do it. Don’t stop.”

Dean looked down ready for his joints to flare up. Growling and panting he hunched further down when his hand felt like it was torn apart.

“Fuck…!” Dean inhaled deeply as his little finger felt like it was twisted all the way round, when Sam touched the last hurt joint. “I’ll kill them!”

Sam let go and left Dean hunched over gasping, doing his best not to move.

“Let’s figure out who we should kill first.”

Dean watched Sam discard of the gloves and put away the balm.

“Sam.”

“Yeah.” Sam turned towards Dean. A sliver of daylight from the covered window grazed over his face and for the first time Dean saw how tired the tall man was.

“Set them.”

“Dean. No.” Sam walked to the chair next to Dean. “Not yet.”

“Set them.”

Sam shook his head. “I can't hold your skin that hard.”

“Sam.” Dean made sure he had eye contact with his brother. “Do you remember how you begged me to set your knee?”

The smile Sam sent him wasn’t what Dean had expected. “Not really, but you told me. You also told me that you only did it because it might had closed of the blood supply to my foot. You’re fingers are the same color as the rest of the hand.”

Sam was right. It was annoying as hell when it happened, especially when Dean hated the outcome as much as now.

“Get some sleep. We’ll do it later if you can move more. Do you need more for the pain?”

Dean shook his head and tilted slowly to the side, just enough that his elbow touched the mattress and he could use that to lower him to his side. Sam placed a pillow under his head and helped him to get all the way down with this hands hovering over the edge of the bed.

“Sure you don’t need anything?”

Dean closed his eyes and nodded, not even wanting to use the energy to say the word.

 

* * *

 

“Sam?”

Dean tried sitting but had no luck in getting up.

“Gotcha.”

Sam was in front of him so fast it almost startled Dean. He grabbed his shoulders and elevated him to sit with his legs over the edge of the bed.

The first thing Dean looked at was his right hand. It was almost normal in color. Only the outer half of his fingers were slightly pink. The swelling around the joints seemed to have stopped going down though. Still too big, but not something to worry too much about.

“Sam…”

“I know. Just try and move them first.”

His left hand wasn’t bad at all; the pain wasn’t bad, only a soreness in the muscles and some stretching of dry skin. It was the same with his thumb and middle finger on the right. The pain in the twisted joints shot up though his arm as he tried to move those three fingers.

“Shit!” He grabbed the edge of the mattress and closed his eyes to make the room stop spinning.

“Dean…!” Sam grabbed Dean’s right wrist and Dean looked at his brother as soon as it was safe to open his eyes. “You moved them. All of them!”

The pain had totally been worth it. He was close to being sure that his hands and all fingers would be okay. But that didn’t mean that he needed to do it again to make sure. He was willing to take Sam’s word for it. He calmed his breathing and straightened his back.

“Let get this done, huh?”

Sam let go of his wrist and stood up. “Okay. You should lie down, and I’m not arguing about the morphine.”

Dean pulled his legs up in the bed. “Well, I’m not either.”

When Dean’s upper body fell a bit faster than calculated, Sam caught him and helped him ease on to the mattress. When he was situated, Sam filled the syringe with the drug once more.

“Don’t…”

“I’m still not going to knock you out Dean!” He pushed in the morphine. “If you somehow wake up and don’t know what’s going on… I don’t want to fight you.”

“Good choice. I can kick you ass even half unconscious.”

“Just shut up and tell me when it’s working.”

Sam sat down on the chair on Dean’s right side. The morphine was working fast. I always did. It was harder to focus on the selected spot on the ceiling and his feet and mercifully his hands felt heavy and numb.

“Dean?”

“I’m ready. Do it fast.”

“Yeah, but there’s three of them Dean.”

Dean prioritized using some of his energy to turn his head just enough to send Sam a demanding look. “You don’t take any breaks. You do this no matter how hard I’m kicking you.”

As careful as he could Dean placed his left hand on his chest and was reassured a bit by the lack of pain from his skin touching something. He handed his right to Sam and closed his eyes as soon as Sam had taken a hold on his wrist.

The scream emptying his lungs, when Sam grabbed his index finger tight, left his throat painfully raw. He gagged as his head filled with the sound of bone moving against cartilage.

“Fuck…!” His words were only formed air between pants. “Shit Sam!”

“Next one. Hang in there.”

His lower arm was electrified with shocks sent from where his hand connected to his little finger. Gagging and chocking on growls he tried to pull his arm back but Sam held it locked down good. Pain spread from his left hand and before he became fully aware that he was clutching his shirt, his whole hand snapped and the sound echoed in his skull and left him blind and sure he was already throwing up.

When the pain moved to the third finger, he was not sure what was up and down or if his screams were even sounds outside his mind anymore.

“Almost there Dea…”

Sam’s voice was the first to leave, then the room and his burning left hand and at last, the agonizing electricity from the twisting bones in his right hand.

 

* * *

 

The skin on his left hand was sensitive and dry when he moved it over the blanket and it felt like he’d been sleeping on his right hand for a whole day. The real pain only hit when he moved it; the joints flared up and overtook the whole hand. He hissed and pulled his arm to his chest.

“Dean?”

“I’m up.”

Dean turned his head and saw Sam sitting at the small table by the window. “Have you slept?”

“No.” Sam shook his head and got up to open the fridge. “How do you feel?”

Surprised by the small amount of pain he was hit with using his left hand to push himself up to sit against the headboard, he took status of his body.

“Well, I still have ten fingers. The frostbite thing isn’t bad anymore, just annoying really. This one though…” Dean rested his right hand carefully in his lab. It wasn’t more than a soreness as long as he didn’t move it, but it was still a bit swollen and a dark purple shade was spreading from the second knuckle of his ring finger and down to his wrist. “Yeah… this might take some time. And I guess that it’s not booze making my memory cloudy, so I the hangover must be from the morphine.”

Sam smiled and came over with a sandwich. “Hungry?”

By the first thought of food Dean’s stomach turned and he was ready to throw himself down, head over the edge of the mattress, but he settled quickly and realized that half the nausea was from hunger anyway. He ate the entire meal using his left hand, equally relieved that his hand was better as he was that Sam didn’t had to feed him.

Sam cleared away after both of them and then came to sit down on the chair next to Dean, but clearly hesitated.

“What, Sammy?”

“I talked to Marie. I sent her a video of me moving your fingers after I set them.”

“Yeah… So?”

“Everything looked good. They’re set right…”

“Well, you better have set them right.” Dean studied Sam. “Sammy. If it’s all good why are you stalling?”

“I’m not. I’m…”

“Sam.” Dean was getting annoyed. Sam had just told him everything was good, so how bad could it be? Sam _was_ able to overthink everything, so maybe it was just one of the times where he was worried about a reaction to what he was going to say.

“We need to make sure nothing is damaged. Something else than just the joints. She wants to see _you_ move them. It can wait. You don’t have to do it now. We can…”

“Sam!” Dean watched his brother freeze mid-sentence. “Rambling.”

“Okay.” Sam silenced and looked at Dean.

“Just get the phone.”

Sam didn’t argue, but seemed hesitant in his movements. Dean had had no intentions of moving his hand for a long time if he could help it, but he couldn’t pass up the possibility of getting a doctor’s word that it was all good. For Sam’s sake too. That kid needed sleep, and Dean was sure he wouldn’t get it before that phone call.

Sam stood next to Dean with the phone in his hand. “Okay…”

It wasn’t difficult moving the fingers. Nothing was tight or locked, but it was like something big and soft was in each of the three joints. The more Dean bend his fingers the more he squeezed it, and the soreness gradually turned into red-hot waves that spread up though his wrist. With clenched jaw and fast breathing through his nose Dean watched as his fingers curled and his hand started shaking.

“Shit!” His hissed out the word, but kept going.

“Dean? Maybe…”

“I’m good Sammy.”

The pain was real, but Dean wasn’t worried that he would do anything to hurt himself. It felt safe to move his fingers, even with the burning spreading up his arm.

As soon as his hand formed a fist, he let go. “Fuck…” He hit his head back on the headboard and closed his eyes; taking some time to gather himself. As soon as his hand was relaxed the pain started to fade and he could breathe easier.

When Dean opened his eyes, he saw Sam sitting with his phone. Texting.

“Did she see it?”

Sam looked up. “She’s opened it. Guessing she’s watching it now.”

Dean closed his eyes again, waiting for the last sliver of pain to go away. Then the familiar sound, of a text entering Sam’s phone, filled the room.

Sam’s shoulders dropped and his breathing got deeper and slower. Dean didn’t even need him to say something.

“She says it looks good. Nothing seemed to move slower than others.”

A new text pinged in and Sam looked at his phone again. Dean hadn’t expected him to laugh.

“What…? Sam?”

“She would have wanted us to wait till it hadn’t hurt that much. She’s sure that you haven’t damaged anything, but from now on you shouldn’t use it unless it doesn’t hurt.”

Sam texted her back before leaving his phone at the table and lying on the untouched second bed in the room.

Dean pushed himself down to lie on his side. The morphine was still messing with his brain and he was tired.

“Are you done worrying about me now?”

“Never.” Sam rolled to his side with his back against Dean. “But I am going to sleep. I guess you can manage now.”

Dean chuckled to himself. “Well, I just have to learn to do things with my left hand then. I might need assistance.”

“I’m not wiping your ass.”

Dean used the next few minutes to watch Sam’s breathing change. He only let his eyelids win after he was sure Sam was sleeping.


End file.
